AustLit

'Caroline’s Dilemma is an excellent example of compelling women’s history. It is a carefully crafted piece of detective work, expanding our knowledge of the history of marriage and family life in the nineteenth-century settler colonial world. The book charts the detailed plight of Caroline Kearney, aged 31 and mother of six children, following her husband Edward’s death in Melbourne in 1865. In his will, Edward insisted that Caroline would be granted 200 pounds a year provided she never married again and moved to the other side of the world to live with her children in Ireland under the watchful eye of his Catholic family. Edward ordered his widow to live in a house chosen by Edward’s brother, where their children would be reared as Catholics. Caroline was left with scant legal rights to her home or children following her husband’s death after he came under the influence of his Irish Catholic brother William, who was determined to wrest his brother’s children away from their Protestant mother’s influence, as his brother sickened and then died. The will suggested that when her children reached adulthood, Caroline would receive a portion of her husband’s sizeable estate – accumulated with her contributions on marriage and their dual labour. The Victorian farm that the family had nurtured, and the children hoped to remain living upon, was ordered to be sold to fund the large family’s passage to Ireland.' (Introduction)